Hey y’all, I’m in a little bit of a jam. When asked to verify my 2017-18 fafsa form, I saw I accidentally didn’t fill in my year’s income for 2015- making is $0. I have already received my financial aid package and reward. This was an honest mistake. I would never purposely lie to a college. I didn’t make enough to file my taxes in 2015, so it wouldn’t have been much of a difference. Should I just ignore the mistake? I wasn’t caught… I was randomly selected to verify my information, so if I don’t say anything I don’t think anything will happen. HELP
If you were randomly selected for verification…the school already WANTS that information. Right?
I can tell you…if you don’t comply with the verification request, your financial aid will be withdrawn, and you might be asked to repay what you have already received.
Provide the accurate and honest information. That is what the school is asking you to do.
You must respond honestly to any request for information. The first time, it wasn’t a lie if there was no intent on your part to report information that wasn’t accurate. If you willfully report inaccurate information now, that will be a lie, and it will cause problems for you.
You have to respond honestly, but don’t worry too much . . . if you didn’t make enough to have to file taxes, it probably won’t impact your financial aid much because you (student and parents) get a certain allowance (Income Protection Allowance) that they don’t count anyway. If you didn’t have to file taxes, then you’re probably below it.
It was my understanding that those selected for verification had to provide data from the IRS Retrieval Tool/Tax Return Transcript OR a Verification of Non-Filing Letter if taxes were not filed and not required to be filed that year. Were you not required to submit any income-related documents like these?
On the bright side, if your aid was already disbursed to you then it is unlikely that there was a problem with the information you provided since you didn’t make enough income to necessitate filing taxes. Just to be on the safe side though I would contact the financial aid office and tell them about the mistake. People make mistakes like this all the time; you won’t be suspected of committing fraud.
Just comply with the request.
Send the college what they asked for.
Absolutely not true. Colleges must do internal audits and they must go through audits with the federal government. If the school is out of compliance or did not follow through with the process they must correct it. If the college did something in error, they must repay the state/federal government, which means they will get the money back from OP.
The ONLY thing you need to do is send the financial aid folks to verification documents they requested. Bottom line is…you won’t receive a nickel more of need based aid until you do so…and they could ask you to repay what they have already given to you if you don’t comply with their requests.
Just send them what the asked for…NOW.
And be done with it.
The ONLY thing you need to do is send the financial aid folks to verification documents they requested. Bottom line is…you won’t receive a nickel more of need based aid until you do so…and they could ask you to repay what they have already given to you if you don’t comply with their requests.
Just send them what the asked for…NOW.
And be done with it.
@sybbie719
It seems that you are correct. In that case, definitely send in the documents requested for verification so that you don’t have to repay any aid received.